BuzzerBeater Forums

I know this has been suggested many times, but hopefully with the money made from Utopia, this is more realistic now. BB needs an App. There are too many people quitting because it is just to hard to manage a team or two (if they have Utopia) with just a phone or an ipad. I know specifically in the USA there was a conversion that included 3-4 Very prominent USA managers that have been around for a long time, all of who say they have debated or are debating quitting because it is too hard for them to manage their teams without an easy access app available. I think a BB app is way past due and now since BB has the money in order to make one, they should. This would make BB easier to access and more managers would stick around longer as well as make new managers want to stay in the game past their first few seasons. I think if this BB app was created seasons ago, we would be closer to 40k users opposed to under 27k.

Poll:  Should BuzzerBeater have an App for easier access?

Also, as incentive, creating the app will add exposure because it would be visible to others in the App Market on their phones. If you were able to register for a team through the app, I believe you would see the user count rise again because of the exposure provided through the app and people willing to play because of the easier access. More users = more money for BB in the long run because people will buy supporter or Utopia teams.

Well then I personally think this should be their ultimate focus for right now then. It is too big of a benefit for this to be added to not have this done. Cost shouldnt be as much of a problem either right now, as I said, due to the money made from Utopia. I suppose the only issue is the external access to the code lines. My point is once this is done more users will stay, more users will join up and BB could make a ton of money by simply making a $2 app that people can buy. Im sure a crap ton of people would get it.

Last edited by E.B.W. at 7/2/2014 6:20:00 PM

I'd buy for sure. I've been managing almost exclusively on mobile for as long as this team has been in existence, and I quit my old team in part because my laptop broke, and managing on the phone I had at the time was a pain in the ass. Three or four years later, it's still a pain in the ass. I rarely get to watch games live, and an app could easily remedy that. This would be a huge improvement to BB, and I'd love to see it implemented soon.

We know there are lots of people which offered to help us with the development of BB for free and this would be a chance to prove that they meant business. They would get some kind of reward, surely, we're not robots

That's why we are considering outsourcing the app to the community and interested devs as a semi open source thing but the greatest obstacle, as has already been said, was code and data access. We don't want developers to be able to gain ingame advantage due to their work on the app.

The only possible solution I thought of so far would be a tight cooperation between the devs and us, where we'd need to build a platform which would give the devs the needed data for their work without giving too much away. It would be a slow and painful process but could be basically essential for the survival of the game in the long run.

I'm open to suggestions (if you don't mind me hijacking this thread) on how to do this, especially from people who have information on how this is kind of thing is usually done. I can also make this more official once we get the general idea on how to do this.

I just saw this right after posting this in another thread.....


First off, I want to say that I have played BB for 5 years in real life and love this game. It is the best online game I've ever played. However, I believe I am one of those managers that EBW was talking about in the first post of thinking about quiting.

Overall, despite BB being a great game, it does not cater to those that are busy. Many of the people who have played BB for awhile and have kept the game running for so long, have grown in real life to a point where there is less time to manage their teams. Like myself, I graduated college, started a career at a bank, just got married, and just bought a house. So as you can see, I am very busy and don't have time to whip out the laptop just to change a roster or make a bid on the TL.

Many others are in the same situation as me, and others will be joining us in the coming years as you see newer managers going off to college and starting their lives. Despite being an amazing game, there just isn't enough time to whip out the laptop, once again. Everyone would rather open an app on their phone and do what they need to that way.

If BB doesn't find out how to get an app in the coming years, I'm afraid it'll come to a point of needing to be shut down. The user base will continue to plummet as the older people get to busy and the younger crowd uses computers less and less and every game become mobile based. BB needs to figure it out so that they don't get left behind.

Now I have never really urged any change to the game during my time on BB, but I am saying it right now, MAKE AN APP AT ALL COSTS!

Use the money generated from the second teams if you have to. Hire on people who play BB if you have too. Do anything you can. This is the one thing that I think everyone will benefit from and there won't be complaints. This should come way before anymore game changes.

I want to thank you Marin for actually posting in this thread. Means a lot to the community to know your really do care.

As you said, an app will be vital to the survival of the game and I'm sure we can all work together to come up with a process for you guys to take to make it happen. :)

If that is what you want to do, then I think your first step would be to make a visible and apparent announcement asking for help. I'm not sure if you have the ability or even want to send a mass e-mail out to the active users, but that could be an option. Once you have the people willing to volunteer for it, set up a private forum where you can exchange information between yourself and the developers. Even though you don't want to give too much away to them, I would err on the side of a "fight or flight" mentality that BB's long-run existence and money-making ability could possibly hinge on the effectiveness of this app.

Hey Marin,

I have some experience in coordinating projects when development is mostly unilateral and systems communicate with different frameworks.

I'm not sure how BB is coded, but if there was some kind of form or method to set up lineups, for instance, it wouldn't really be expensive or difficult to create an interface to receive roster data, enable users to play with it and then send it back. I know I'm talking about one simple functionality inside the game, but I'd recommend an incremental approach anyway.

This should enable the mobile devs to code an app without ever touching or seeing the code behind BB as they would only need some kind of spec of the data exchange.

I'd be glad to help with that part, I'm not a coder, but I can contribute in some other ways. :)

P.S.: Even if there aren't any forms like that, I don't believe the cost to create them would be high anyways.



Last edited by Welington at 7/3/2014 11:09:38 AM

Did you think about outsourcing the whole app-development to a student or group? Like a bachelor/master thesis. You would have a dev who isn't interessted in gaining advantage and who has an own interest in it's success.